At the House Science Committeeäs hearing
on NASAäs Mars Program, Part II (6/20/00), Chairman James
Sensenbrenner (R-WI) launched a rhetorical broadside at the space
agency. "Congress and the American people can all deal with
failure," the Wisconsin Congressman pontificated. "We have a harder
time accepting carelessness."

"The mission errors might be forgivable,"
Sensenbrenner explained. "Itäs NASAäs failure to deal
with a known problem that bothers me."

Despite the managerial mistakes with the Mars
missions, the Chairman fully endorsed the faster, better, cheaper
(FBC) method for planetary exploration. "In the wake of these
fiascoes," he huffed, "some have attacked the faster, cheaper,
better philosophy. They want to add more bureaucracy. But
thatäs a cop-out. Faster, better, cheaper works."

Congressman Vern Ehlers (R-MI) agreed FBC was a
"good idea." He said we can "expect to have failures." But the Mars
mission losses, he stated, were "stupid mistakes," errors that
should have been discovered and corrected.

Four witnesses testified at the hearing. The NSS
submitted written testimony at the committee's request (see
document at the end of this report).

Daniel Goldin, NASA Administrator

"Rather than play the blame game," Mr. Goldin
explained NASA was "focusing upon understanding the root causes"
for the mission failures and taking steps to correct the
deficiencies to achieve "higher levels of skill" in management and
leadership. "Increased focus," he said, "will be place on ensuring
technical competencies, cutting edge knowledge and formal academic
training, as well as leadership skills."

Goldin again publicly accepted responsibility for
the mission losses. He explained budgets for the missions were
tight because he is seeking to reduce the cost for each planetary
mission to about $100 million.

Minimal oversight was the intended purpose when NASA
signed a "Total Systems Contract" with Lockheed Martin to build
both the Mars orbiter and lander for $121 million. (The total does
not include scientific instruments.) Goldin lamented some
organizations are capable of handling such responsibility, while
others ù meaning Lockheed Martin ù are not yet
ready.

Goldin said he has not asked the Administration for
additional funds to correct the

management weaknesses. "Money," he offered, "is not
the magic ingredient." He explained managers often ask for more
funds to complete a mission. How has the Administrator handled such
requests? When people come to his office with their hands out, he
confessed, "I throw them out on their heads."

To improve the Mars Program and prepare for an
eventual human mission, Goldin said we "need new technologies for
precision atmospheric entry, adaptive hazard avoidance
capabilities, and robust safe landing systems." Also critical, he
added, are improved imagery and better communications.

Edward Stone, Director Jet Propulsion
Laboratory

Director Stone acknowledged JPL, in its reviews, did
not believe the Mars missions were underfunded. He explained the
"Mars 98 spacecraft were designed and developed by Lockheed Martin
under a system contract, with minimal engagement of JPL expertise."
In future missions, he assured Committee members, there would be
"adequate engagement."

Stone announced a series of "key actions" JPL has
implemented to prevent future problems. JPL formed a Mars Program
Office with a Program Manager who reports directly to Stone. JPL
formed a new directorate for Space Science Flight Projects to
"focus exclusively on the successful implementation of space
science flight projects." And a Systems Management Office was
established to conduct independent mission assessments.

To pay for the additional oversight, Stone said he
would use funds that had been allocated for the 2001 Mars lander,
which was canceled.

Pedro Rustan, Space Consultant, Former Director
of the Clementine Mission

"Speaking bluntly," Mr. Rustan offered, "I am
stunned by the paucity of leadership demonstrated by the management
teams involved in the Mars Climate Orbiter (MCO) and the Mars Polar
Lander. Less management is not synonymous with no management."

JPL and Lockheed Martin were "well aware of the fact
that there were navigation anomalies in the very early part of the
flight to Mars." Mr. Rustan said there was plenty of time to
diagnose and correct the problem. "Instead of solving the problem,
both teams ignored it until the last few weeks of flight when the
team finally requested an unscheduled propulsion burn in an attempt
to correct the trajectory."

"A competent senior manager would have put together
a tiger team to investigate the [anomalies] and take corrective
action thus solving the problem. Instead, the MCO program managers
at LM and JPL were reticent to report any bad news to their
superiors, because all the funds for the program had been accounted
for and any corrective action would require unavailable funds."

Rustan said there is "no magic in the FBC concept."
"Quite plainly," he explained, "it is effective, streamlined
management." But "mission success and system reliability must never
be sacrificed under the FBC concept."

Rustan said NASA programs already require too many
reviews, which often "rob critical time from the mission while
adding little value." He also disagreed money was a solution.
"Donät believe that dumping more money into a program will
resolve most problems; it is quite the opposite," he explained.
More money for more reviews or to add new capability after a design
is finalized "is counterproductive."

"I am both deeply concerned about ù and
strongly disagree with ù the main conclusions presented in
both the Young Report and Tony Spearäs NASA Faster, Better,
Cheaper Task Force final report," Mr. Binder exclaimed. He said the
"solutions" advocated by the reports ù more money, more
oversight, and more management ù are wrong. The Lunar
Prospector demonstrated that "inexpensive missions can be
successfully defined, developed, and flown with an absolute minimum
of both management and NASA oversight."

"If the Young and Spear recommendations are
followed," Binder warned, "I firmly believe that we will have
started down the slippery path back to the old, expensive, slow way
of exploring space."

Binder said more money, more management and more
oversight "does not insure mission success." As evidence, he
pointed to the $800 million Mars Observer which suffered a
catastrophic failure, the $3 billion Hubble Space Telescope with
the flawed lens, and the stuck antenna on the $1.3 billion Galileo
spacecraft.

Members of the Committee, thank you for the
opportunity to provide testimony on NASAäs "faster, better,
cheaper" (FBC) approach to the design and management of planetary
spacecraft. This new approach for building space vehicles has come
under review as a result of the recent failures of two Martian
space probes. Last September, the Mars Climate Orbiter approached
the Red Planet on the wrong trajectory because workers substituted
U.S. linear measurements for metric measurements. Experts believe
the craft flew too close to the planet and it either burned up in
the atmosphere or crashed into the surface. The sister spacecraft
ù the Mars Polar Lander ù entered the planetäs
upper atmosphere on the proper trajectory in preparation for a soft
landing near the south polar cap, but then something happened
during the descent or while landing and contact was never
reestablished.

The loss of the two spacecraft cost about $325
million. More important, however, is the loss of the science. The
orbiter was designed to search for water on the planetäs
surface, an important goal to determining whether life may have
existed ù or continues to exist ù on Mars. The
orbiter also was to have collected data on the thin Martian
atmosphere to understand its climate history. The Polar Lander, had
it survived, would have been the first craft to explore the
southern hemisphere. The lander was equipped with a robotic arm to
collect soil samples.

In the past, when a mission failed, years were
required to recapture the lost science. Fortunately, this will not
be the case with the Mars spacecraft. The scientific investigation
of Mars is an ongoing program at NASA. Every 26 months, when Earth
and Mars come into alignment, the United States plans to launch
probes to explore the planet. In future flights, the scientific
instruments designed for the lost orbiter and lander can be reflown
to search for water and collect data on the Martian climate.

Following the mission failures, NASA appointed
panels to investigate the Mars mission failures and to review the
overall Mars Surveyor program and the "faster, better, cheaper"
approach to designing and building spacecraft.

A "Faster, Better, Cheaper" NASA

When Daniel S. Goldin was appointed NASA
Administrator in 1991, Americaäs space program was in a
shambles. According to a General Accounting Office survey, the
average NASA program was experiencing a 77% cost growth. The Space
Station, announced in 1984, had been redesigned numerous times and
was facing cancellation due to cost overruns and delays. The Space
Shuttle repeatedly couldnät get off of the pad because of
technical problems.

The new Administrator introduced a series of reforms
to reduce the cost overruns and eliminate the delays. He downsized
the workforce, eventually cutting 6,600 personnel, chopped wasteful
spending, and shut down duplicative programs. Mr. Goldin also
revised the agencyäs mission statement to reflect the end of
the Cold War and the foreign policy changes triggered by the
dismantling of the Soviet Union.

Reforms were also implemented in the space science
program. When Mr. Goldin assumed the helm at NASA, the agency was
building large and expensivespacecraft to explore the solar system.
Because of the time and cost to build the space goliaths, NASA
could afford but a limited number of missions. During the 1980s,
the agency launched only two planetary probes ù Magellan to
map Venus and Galileo to explore Jupiter.

Because "battleship galactica" spacecraft are so
costly and time consuming to build, much is at stake. The mission
becomes so immense that our nationäs prestige is put on the
line. Consequently, engineers are reluctant to utilize newer
technologies that are better and cheaper, but are also riskier.
Finally, because NASA could afford to build and launch only a
couple major spacecraft per decade, our educational institutions
suffered. Scientists and graduate students had limited
opportunities to study planetary science due to the large gaps
between missions and a paucity of data.

To remedy the shortcomings in NASAäs space
science program, Administrator Goldin introduced the "faster,
better, cheaper" model, which has long been a mantra of private
industry. Companies daily strive to achieve a competitive advantage
in the marketplace by designing and constructing better products,
in less time, and for less cost. These goals are an ongoing
challenge. Businesses cannot afford to rest on their laurels and
constantly seek improvements to remain competitive.

With recent technological innovations and advances
in miniaturization smaller, more frequent planetary missions to
explore the solar system offer many advantages and can fulfil many,
but not all scientific objectives. Smaller missions carry fewer
scientific instruments and thus are less complex to design, use
less power, and can be launched on smaller, lower-cost rockets.
Mounting smaller missions means NASA can afford to send multiple
spacecraft to explore bodies in the solar system. If a mission
should fail, spacecraft can more easily be replaced. Small,
less-complex missions are simpler to manage, can be completed in
less time, and do not require extensive systems engineering and
coordination among scientists.

The information gleaned from an initial mission can
be used to focus research on subsequent missions, enhancing the
quality of the science. And because there are numerous missions
each year, a great deal of data is generated for analysis by
scientists and graduate students. This, in turn, rapidly advances
our knowledge of the solar system and keeps our educational
institutions the very best in the world.

The managers of the Strategic Defense Initiative
also were strong proponents of the "faster, better, cheaper"
approach to reduce the cost of space access and spacecraft design.
To provide a protective shield against a nuclear attack by the
Soviet Union, the United States would have to launch hundreds of
spacecraft to orbit, a daunting and expensive challenge. The
managers believed it was possible to build and launch probes for
substantially less than proposed by industry. To demonstrate the
new philosophy, the Naval Research Laboratory was allocated $75
million for the Clementine mission to the Moon. The vehicle was
subsequently designed, developed and launched in just 22 months.
The "quick and cheap" mission was successful and validated the new
philosophy for

managing space programs.

NASAäs New Mission

NASA is a product of the Cold War, established to
compete with the Soviet Union, which had successfully placed the
first satellite in orbit, the first mammal in orbit, and launched
the first rocket to the Moon. These achievements were widely
reported by the world media and touted by Soviet leaders as
evidence of the superiority of Communism.

Beating the Soviet Union in the race to space became
a national priority for America. To best the Soviets, billions of
dollars flowed into the space program. At its peak, NASA received
about five percent of the federal budget.

Because a failure in the space program was viewed as
a political defeat on the world stage, government officials placed
a premium on mission success. Time also was a critical element.
President Kennedy announced that Americans would land on the Moon
by the end of the decade. It was imperative to move quickly to
achieve this goal. Consequently, the cost to build and launch
spacecraft, and the science to be gained from venturing into space,
were of secondary concern.

Following the success of the Apollo program,
Americaäs investment in space exploration declined
dramatically. The focus of our foreign relations with the Soviet
Union shifted from direct competition to detente. Instead of
building more and bigger nuclear weapons, the superpowers entered
into negotiations to limit the number of launchers and
warheads.

Advances in space exploration remained politically
charged. Although not directly competing in space to achieve a
specific goal, the U.S. and U.S.S.R nevertheless were watchful of
each otheräs space programs. The Soviet Union tried to match
the Space Shuttle program by building a similar launch vehicle. The
decision by the United States to build a space station was, inpart,
an effort to keep up with the Soviet Union, which had been
operating a station for many years.

When the Cold War ended, the political justification
to support the expenditure of vast resources for space programs
quickly evaporated. The collapse of the Soviet Union foreshadowed
many changes for Americaäs space and defense industries. To
reflect the dramatic reordering in the world map, Administrator
Goldin called for a new mission statement for NASA. He engaged the
space agencyäs entire workforce, encouraging everyone to
submit recommendations. Given a new world order, should NASAäs
priorities be altered? Was its mandate still relevant? How could
NASA better serve Americaäs interests?

After many months of discussion and numerous drafts,
NASA produced a new mission statement. At its most fundamental
level, the statement declares that "NASA is an investment in
Americaäs future." A major purpose of the agency is to conduct
research and develop technology in partnership with industry and
academia to maintain Americaäs economic growth and prosperity.
In short, NASA is a technology driver. In addition to gaining new
knowledge, a primary purpose for exploring the universe is to
innovate new technologies to maintain Americaäs leadership in
advanced technology.

Space presents unique challenges for engineers.
Space is a formidable environment with extreme temperatures. Power
on spacecraft is limited.

Designs must be highly reliable and guard against
radiation. To withstand launch, systems must be rugged. Volume and
weight must be kept to a minimum. To overcome all of these
challenges requires engineers to seek different solutions than when
solving technical problems on Earth. The process forces innovation
and creativity. The new technologies developed for space
programs,

in turn, are transferred to private industry to keep
U.S. companies ahead of the competition. Applying the "faster,
better, cheaper" model to space creates a dynamic process for
improvement, to build vehicles smaller and faster, which are more
capable and affordable. It is an incubator for new ideas and new
ways of doing business. By exploring space, we assist companies on
Earth.

"Faster, Better, Cheaper" Keeps America
Competitive

As recent investigations have proved NASAäs
"faster, better, cheaper" lacks a universally accepted definition
but the space science FBC program has been managed to promote the
development of advanced technology. Engineers are provided reduced
levels of funding and smaller launchers for subsequent missions in
the Mars program. Engineers must then come up with new solutions to
meet the mission requirements. The process forces innovation and
drives the development of advanced technologies. Finding new ways
to dramatically lower the cost of space exploration allows NASA to
mount additional missions for less money. Reducing timetables cuts
costs and speeds exploration. More missions translate to more data
for study by our scientists and graduate students, keeping our
universities the best in the world.

As currently configured, mission success is no
longer the only goal of planetary exploration, as in the past when
each launch of a payload was politically important to
Americaäs national security. As Administrator Goldin explains,
if there are no failures in planetary exploration, not enough
pressure is being applied to force the development of newer, better
technologies. He said, out of ten potential flights, one to two
failures would be tolerable.

Given NASAäs new mission, it is critical to
push the envelope, to think out of the box, to have the freedom to
fail. Americaäs ongoing investment in the Mars Surveyor
program will reap enormous benefits. We will learn if life may have
existed on Mars or continues to exist. We will learn about the Red
Planetäs history and climate. Billions of years ago, Earth and
Mars had warm, wet climates. Today, Mars is cold with a thin
atmosphere. What happened? By understanding why the climate of Mars
changed, we will be able to better understand Earthäs complex
climate system.

By using the "faster, better, cheaper" model to
design and build spacecraft, we will force the development of new
technologies to reduce the cost of space science and keep America
competitive. We will ensure our children have opportunities in the
future and that our country generates sufficient wealth to afford
our social programs and to protect our national security. But this
approach will only be successful if the space agency has a first
rate research and development program to initiate and develop work
on the new technologies (a new instrument or penetrator should not
need to be selected for flight in order to attract serious
development funding), and adheres closely to engineering
fundamentals.

The Pathfinder mission to Mars is an excellent
example of the "faster, better, cheaper" approach to space
exploration. It demonstrated the validity of the model to building
and launching spacecraft. That mission, because it was initiated as
a technology demonstration mission, had extensive oversight by
seasoned, experienced senior engineers ù something that was
conspicuously missing from the Mars Climate Orbiter and Mars Polar
Lander Missions.

We must guard against adding layers of bureaucracy
or dumping more money into the program to remedy what is not
broken. We must ensure that experienced engineers are allowed to do
their job, express their concerns, and are engaged in every level
of the program.

While the old NASA was created as a tool of foreign
policy and the new NASA as a response to globalization, one element
remains the same ù the necessity to seek bold challenges, to
explore the unknown, to open up the near frontier to all who want
to go; to venture into the far frontier to learn about the cosmos;
and in doing so to learn about ourselves. "Faster, better, cheaper"
fuels the "can-do" spirit and accelerates advances in space and
here on Earth.

A restructured, well organized Mars Surveyor Program
will unlock many of the secrets of life and will help to define our
place in the universe. A strong adherence to engineering and
research fundamentals, enhanced by closer collaboration with our
best academic institutions will ensure economic strength and
technology leadership well into the 21st century.

P.A. Dasch/June 16, 2000

The
National Space Society is a pro-space advocacy organization whose
20,000 members worldwide are working to create a spacefaring
civilization. To learn more about NSS and its programs, call
202-543-1900 or go to http://www.nss.org